Wheat Pete's Word, Aug 8: An early end to flowering, water volumes, and weed control fails

This season’s hot weather and wild rain (and lack of it) is having a surprising impact on the soybean crop, says Wheat Pete’s Word host Peter Johnson.

That’s where we start with this week’s episode. From there, Wheat Pete answers your questions on seeding rate, good coverage for insecticide applications, cover crop establishment, and so much more. (Summary below the player)

Have a question you’d like Johnson to address? Or some yield results to send in? Leave him a message at 1-888-746-3311, send him a tweet (@wheatpete), or email him at [email protected]

SUMMARY

• We’ve gone from too dry to far too wet. There’s a compaction field day coming up — it might be too wet to run the demos!
• The one consistent story across Canada is that it’s been hot hot hot. This has a few impacts, as Peter gets to in this episode, but first:
• Trivia time! Yarrow, the weed of war (see tweet below) was carried to staunch wounds and clot blood. Used to serve a neat purpose. Now you know.
• We know that August rain makes soybeans but was July rain too late? Horst Bohner says soybeans shouldn’t be done flowering, but it looks like they’ve accumulated enough heat to shut down the flowering period. The longer season beans, less so. Rainfall will help fill, of course, but it looks like the July water was just too late with all that heat.
• Want good control of lygus bugs, spider mites, and other insects? It’s less about nozzle selection and more about water volume. More water equals better control. Other considerations: boom height, droplet size. Keep that boom about 20″ of the canopy higher and stick with medium coarse droplets for on-target sprays
• Weedy IP soys, what’s going on here? A listener says thesprayer came hours before planting in dry, dry conditions, and it was windy and dusty, and he got super poor weed control. Did the herbicide leave in the dust? Pete explains that likely only 1% of active was lost. So why did it not work? Likely IP soy on IP soys are the culprit — weeds gone to seed last year have polluted the field.
• PSA: take responsibility for your drift!
• Boom cleanout is so important! Noticing v-patterns in wheat from fungicide app? End caps likely still had product in them.
• One listener has dissolved urea, ready to go, but no rain. How long can you wait? You’ve got a window of about 3 weeks past heading. You’ve either got to give ‘er or don’t bother. The crop is turning? You’re likely too late
• Plot trial results: protein boosts, burned leaves, and bumper crops. What was the recipe?
• Remember replicates matter! You have to have enough replication to give confidence in results. Two replicates, averaged out with high variability isn’t enough to base decisions on.
• Counting seeds, tillers, heads on variable soil for winter wheat. What can you do differently?  Depending on soil type you may need to bump seeding rate, and early N is critical on clay soil.
• Cover crops: Can I broadcast oats with fertilizer into wheat stubble? Yes, but double the seeding rate (40-60 pounds to get the same stand)

The weed of war-Yarrow(Achillea millefolium L) is a common sight along roadsides, lawns even as an ornamental. From ancient wars to WW1, it was essential for warriors to carry plants to staunch wounds. Yarrow contains the alkaloid achilleine, which is an active hemostatic agent pic.twitter.com/rp4bEG34Nb

— Dave Bilyea (@dbilyea2) August 7, 2018

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